United Kingdom
Victims of the State

England

Perry Family

Aug 16, 1660

William Harrison, the manager of
a wealthy estate, went out to collect rent money from tenants. When he did
not return at his usual time, his servant, John Perry, was sent to look for
him. Harrison's hat and comb were found and had been slashed. Harrison's
collar band was also found with bloodstains. Harrison was presumed murdered
and searches were made for his body, but it was never found.

For unknown
reasons, John Perry confessed to the murder of Harrison and implicated his
brother and mother. Perry later retracted his confession and his brother
and mother professed their innocence, but all were convicted of the murder
and hanged. Two years after the executions, Harrison turned up alive. He
told a story of having been kidnapped and held as a slave in Turkey. (CWP)
(CW)
(FJDB) (F)
[12/06]

England

William Habron

Aug 1, 1876

William Habron was convicted of the murder of Constable Cock, a local
lawman. Habron was a patron of the Royal Oak, a pub near
Manchester that was on the constable's beat. Habron was frequently getting
into fights with other patrons, which Cock had to break up. After one
fight Cock threatened to arrest Habron the next time he got into a fight. Habron replied, “It'll be a sorry day for you, the day you arrest me.” The next time Cock passed the pub and heard sounds of a fight, he entered
without waiting to be called and saw Habron and another patron in the midst
of a fight. Cock arrested Habron. However, Habron had actually been on
his best behavior. The other patron had interpreted Habron's
behavior as a sign of weakness and, inspired by liquor, decided that it was
a good time to pick a fight.Read More by Clicking Here

England

Adolph Beck

1895

Adolph Beck was convicted in 1896 of individually defrauding ten women out their jewelry,
mostly rings, using the same confidence scheme. The swindler had posed
as the Earl of Wilton and claimed to have a home in St. John's Wood. Beck was identified by all ten women. In addition he was identified as
John Smith, a man who had been convicted of perpetrating a identical
confidence scheme in 1877. At trial Beck's defence wanted to
cross-examine the crown's handwriting expert to established that documents
submitted into evidence as having been in Beck's handwriting were actually
in the same hand as those attributed to Smith in 1877. In addition it
wanted to present testimony that Beck had been in South America in 1877 and
for several years thereafter. However, the judge prohibited this
defence. Legal rules prohibited the crown from mentioning a prior
conviction, so the judge apparently felt the defence should be prohibited as
well.

Evidence later surfaced that Smith had been examined by a prison
doctor in 1879, who stated in his report that Smith had undergone
circumcision. Beck was examined and found to be uncircumcised. The only effect of this new evidence was that Beck, who had been assigned
Smith's old prison number, was given a new prison number. Beck was
released from prison in 1901.

In 1904, Beck was again arrested for defrauding women using the same
confidence scheme. He was again convicted, but his sentencing was
deferred until further investigation could be made. During
this period, while stories of defrauded women were in the newspapers, a
pawnshop owner called police about a man pawning rings in his shop. The man said his name was William Thomas and that he was innocent of any
wrongdoing. However, he was identified by several swindled women who
also identified rings in his possession as their property. Following
Thomas's conviction, he admitted that he was John Smith and that he was
responsible for the frauds for which Beck had twice been convicted. Beck was soon pardoned and Parliament awarded him £5,000 for his wrongful
imprisonment. (CTI) [6/08]

England

Luton Three

Sept 10, 1969 (Luton)

David Cooper, Michael McMahon,
and Patrick Murphy were convicted of murdering a Luton, England post office
clerk during an attempted robbery of the post office. An unusually
large amount of money was being held in the post office overnight. The
victim, Reginald Stevens, a sub-postmaster, had locked up the post office
and was shot to death in a nearby parking lot (car park) after he refused to
hand over his keys.Read More by Clicking Here

England

Pinfold & MacKenney

Nov 1974

Terry Pinfold
and Harry MacKenney were convicted of murder based on the testimony of a
sole witness. This witness testified the pair murdered a man, but this man
was later known to be alive three years after his alleged slaying.Read More by Clicking Here

England (Winchester CC)

Sean Hodgson

Dec 1979 (Southampton)

Robert Graham “Sean” Hodgson was convicted of the murder of Teresa de
Simone, 22. De Simone's partially clothed body had been found in the
back of her Ford Escort outside the Tom Tackle pub in Southampton where she
worked part-time as a barmaid. She had been strangled with her own
gold chain. Twelve months later, Hodgson, who had been in the area at
the time, confessed committing the murder to a prison chaplain, prison
warders, and police while serving a jail sentence for a separate crime. Four other people had also confessed to the crime, but their confessions
were discounted by detectives. Hodgson later pleaded not guilty on the
grounds he was a pathological liar. Material recovered at the scene
belonged to a man of blood group A or AB. Hodgson shared this group,
although so did about one-third of the male population. However, in
2009, DNA tests of semen recovered from the scene showed that it did not
belong to Hodgson and his conviction was quashed. He was released
after serving 27 years of imprisonment and believed to be the victim of
Britain's “longest miscarriage of justice.” (Telegraph)
[3/09]

England (London CC)

Roy Burnett

1985

Roy Burnett was convicted of
raping a 20-year-old student nurse. The alleged victim said Burnett
had followed her home from a bus, dragged her into the woods and threatened
her with a knife before raping her. Burnett was jailed for life and
his applications for parole were consistently denied because he refused
to admit guilt. In 1998 the same woman made another rape complaint,
but gave inconsistent accounts of being attacked by two men in a car. The complaint damaged the woman's credibility and caused police to
re-examine her previous complaint against Burnett.

A re-examination
of evidence against Burnett revealed many inconsistencies in the woman's
accounts. Scratch marks on her body, shown in photographs taken of her at
the time, were, according to fresh expert testimony, “typical of
self-inflicted injury.” A judge later added that the absence of
other injuries, which would have been expected if she had been attacked in
the way she claimed, was “surprising to the point of incredulity.” The woman's
current boyfriend, with whom she has just had a child, described her as
“attention seeking.” Burnett was released from jail after being
cleared by the Court of Appeal. Scotland Yard is considering whether
to file perjury charges against the woman. (Innocent)
[9/08]

England (Chelmsford CC)

Jeremy Bamber

Aug 7, 1985

Jeremy Bamber, 25, was convicted of the shooting murders of his
father, Ralph Nevill Bamber, 61, his mother, June Bamber, 61, his sister, Sheila Caffell,
27, and his twin nephews, Daniel and Nicholas Caffell, both 6. Jeremy was
adopted by his parents as was his unrelated sister. The killings
occurred at White House Farm in Tolleshunt D'Arcy, Essex. At 3:36 a.m.
on August 7, 1985, Jeremy called the police from his cottage in Goldhanger, 3
1/2 miles away, to tell them that Nevill had phoned him and
said that Sheila, a paranoid schizophrenic, had “gone crazy” and
had got a gun. Sheila was known to have considered ending her life and
expressed an intention to kill her sons. After calling police, Jeremy
drove to White House Farm and met up with officers who were already there. Police staked out the farmhouse for several hours before entering it at 7:34
a.m. where they found five people shot to death. Sheila was found shot
twice under the chin with a rifle in her hand. Police initially
thought Sheila had committed the murders before turning the gun on herself.Read More by Clicking Here

England (Stafford CC)

Roger Beardmore

1991-1993

Roger Beardmore was convicted in 1998 of pedophile rape after being accused
by an 11-year-old girl. At the time of the alleged offense, Beardmore
was living at a farmhouse 15 miles from Stoke-on-Trent. The girl told
her mother that between the ages of three and six she had been raped and
interfered with when visiting Beardmore's farm. Three years later the
girl admitted that she made the whole thing up to gain the attention of her
mother. She said, “I have put a man in prison for no reason.” The girl now says she never wants to see her mother again. She
expressed the wish to right a wrong which had been keeping her awake, crying
at night. Following the girl's admission, Beardmore's conviction was
quashed and he was released from prison. (Innocent)
[10/08]

England (Manchester CC)

Kevin Callan

Apr 15, 1991

“Kevin Callan was wrongly convicted of murder in 1991 of shaking to death
his girlfriend's 4-year-old daughter, Amanda Allman, based on the testimony
of two prosecution experts. ... Callan was sentenced to life in
prison. He became an expert in neurology and his knowledge helped
prove that his daughter, who had cerebral palsy, died from the after-effects
of brain damage caused by an earlier fall. ... Callan spent four
years prison before the Court of Appeal overturned his conviction on April
6, 1995, based on the new medical evidence about the girl's cause of death. The charges were dismissed and Callan was released. Callan wrote a
[1997] book about his experience [entitled Kevin Callan's Story.] .... Callan died [in] 2003 at the age of 45. Callan's sister and
supporter during his ordeal, Janice Davies, helped to set-up the
organisation ‘Innocent,’ to support Kevin and other wrongly convicted
prisoners and their families in the United Kingdom. ‘Innocent's’
website is, http://www.innocent.org.uk” –
FJDB
(Innocent)

England (Hove CC)

Sheila Bowler

May 13, 1992 (East Sussex)

Sheila Bowler was convicted of
murdering her late husband's 89-year-old aunt, Florence Jackson. While
Bowler was driving Jackson one night, a tire on her car became deflated and
Bowler stopped on Route A259 near Station Road in Winchelsea. She left
Jackson in the car and went to seek help. She knocked on the door of a residence
and met a Mr. Soan. She used his telephone to call
for roadside assistance. When she came back to her car with Mr. and
Mrs. Soan, Jackson was missing. In the search for Jackson that
followed, Bowler told others not to look far away, as she did not think
Jackson was mobile enough to have wandered very far. Jackson's
body was found the next day 600 yards away in the River Brede. She had
drowned.Read More by
Clicking Here

England (Birmingham CC)

Julie Ferris

1993, 1998

“Julie Ferris was wrongly convicted in June 2000 of smothering two of her
children. [The first child, Hayley, died at nine months in 1993 and
initially was thought to have been a cot-death victim. When the second
child, Brandon, died five years later, aged eight months, Ferris was
arrested.] The prosecution relied on the ... testimony of
discredited expert witness Sir Roy Meadows – the same expert whose erroneous
testimony contributed to the wrongful convictions of Sally Clark and Angela Cannings. [Ferris's] conviction was reversed in May 2003 and she was
released on bail pending a retrial, which was scheduled for November 2004.
On August 6, 2004 the prosecution announced it was dropping all charges
against Julie Ferris.” –
FJDB (Times)

England (Stafford CC)

Ryan James

Jan 13, 1994

Ryan James was convicted of the murder of his
39-year-old wife, Sandra James. Sandra died from drinking a glass of orange juice that contained a fatal dose of immobilon, a horse tranquilizer. Ryan, a veterinarian, had access to the drug. He also been having an
affair with another woman, Catherine Crooks. The lovers had left their
spouses to live together, but the cost of running two homes drove Ryan back
to his wife.

Sandra's death
would have allowed Ryan to start a new life with Catherine on the proceeds
of a £180,000 life insurance policy. Besides these proceeds,
£143,000 in debts were wiped out by Sandra's death. At trial, Ryan's
defense argued that Sandra had committed suicide, but made it look like
murder. However, the crown argued that it was murder made to look like
a suicide. Ryan was sentenced to life in prison. His trial
judge,
Justice Anthony Hidden, told him he was “the most evil, selfish, and
criminally callous man” he had ever sentenced.

While in prison
Ryan married Catherine, who never believed he killed his wife. While
going through her new husband's belongings, Catherine found a handwritten
note stuffed inside one of Ryan's professional journals. It was in
Sandra's handwriting and said, “Ryan, I leave you absolutely nothing but
this note – if you find it in time, Sam.” Sam was Sandra's pet name. Because the note indicated suicidal intent, Ryan's conviction was quashed in
1998 and he was released from prison. There was some additional
evidence that Sandra was depressed. She had taken anti-depressants in
the 1970s. At the time of Sandra's death there were puncture wounds
in her foot. It was alleged that she had experimented with the
immobilon drug by injecting it into her foot, then injecting herself with
the antidote shortly thereafter. (Innocent)
[10/08]

England (Leeds CC)

Mark Dallagher

May 7, 1996

Mark Dallagher was convicted of the murder of 94-year-old Dorothy Wood. Wood was found dead at her home on Whitby Avenue in Huddersfield. She
had been smothered with a pillow. A burglar had entered the home
through a transom window above her bed. Wood was profoundly deaf and slept downstairs because of a heart condition.

Ear prints were found on the glass immediately below the transom. West
Yorkshire police sent these prints along with prints of Dallagher's ears to Cornelis Van der Lugt, an alleged ear print
expert. Police suspected Dallagher might be the culprit because he was a small-time burglar who
lived in the area. Van der Lugt was Dutch police officer for 27 years
and a lecturer at the Dutch Police College. He had no formal
qualifications, but he had become interested in ear print identification and
read what was available on that topic. He had built up a portfolio of
about 600 photographs and 300 ear prints.

At trial, Van der Lugt testified that he was
“absolutely convinced that
the prints of [Dallagher's] left ear were identical with the prints of the
left ear on the window.” Another Crown expert, Peter Vanezis,
considered Van der Lugt to be the ear print expert in the world, and
testified that “it was very likely that it was this defendant who made those
prints,” although he could not be one hundred percent certain. Vanezis
was Regius Professor of Forensic Medicine and Science at the University of
Glasgow.

Following Dallagher's conviction, two other criminal convictions that
relied on ear print evidence were overturned, one in the
U.S. (David Kunze), and another in the Netherlands. Both relied on Van
der Lugt's testimony. In 2002, an
appeals court also overturned Dallagher's conviction because it found fault with
the manner in which the experts expressed their opinion of Dallagher's
guilt. Following the reversal, an initial report given by Van der Lugt
surfaced in which he stated that the ear prints found on
Wood's window were definitely not those of Dallagher. The words
“definitely not” were underlined twice.

A retrial for Dallagher began in 2003, but it was halted after 10 days
as the prosecution sought to gather additional evidence. However,
additional evidence was not forthcoming and DNA tests of the ear prints
showed they did not belong to Dallagher. As a result, charges against Dallagher were
dropped in 2004. He was released from imprisonment after serving seven years
of a life sentence. (Innocent) (Forensic-Evidence)
[11/09]

England (Winchester CC)

Sally Clark

Dec 1996, Jan 1998

“Sally Clark was wrongly
convicted of killing two of her young children 13 months apart. Her
conviction was based on the testimony of a medical ‘expert’ that it is
virtually impossible that two babies in one family would die of natural
causes, and on the perjured testimony of the government's forensic scientist
that she smothered the children. The first baby, Christopher, died at
11 weeks of age in Dec. 1996, and the second child, Harry, died at 8 weeks
of age in Jan. 1998.”

“In 2002 it was
discovered that the prosecution concealed a medical report that indicated
there is identifiable physical evidence the second child died of natural
causes, and it was the concealment of that report that led to the death of
the first child being changed from natural causes to smothering, and the
death of the second child being attributed first to shaking, and then to
smothering. It was learned by Sally Clark's husband, Stephen, after
the trial that at least 50 families in the UK every year suffer the death of
a second child after the previous death of a child, and Manchester
University researchers discovered in 2001 that there is a ‘crib death’ gene
(SIDS). A common denominator in both of the deaths is they both occurred
shortly after the babies received vaccinations.”

“Clark's
convictions were quashed by the Court of Appeals on January 29, 2003 ...
Clark died of an apparent heart attack [in] 2007, at the age of 42.” –
FJDB

England (Sheffield CC)

Shaun Booker

June 19, 1999

Shaun
Booker was convicted of manslaughter for beating 57-year-old Michael Marples
to death in a Sheffield parking lot. Booker was convicted because the
prosecution claimed that blood found on his clothes splattered on him during
the assault. Booker claimed the blood got on him when he found Marples
after the assault and tried to revive him. Booker's trial jury acquitted him of
murder but convicted him of manslaughter. In February 2006 at the
request of the Crown, an appeals court quashed Booker's conviction based on
new evidence which it said “casts very great doubt on the correctness of the
appellant having been the assailant.” However, the court refused to
reveal what the new evidence was, stating, “We are satisfied...that the
nature of the evidence is such it cannot be disclosed without causing
serious damage to the public interest.” (Innocent)
[12/10]

England (Lewes CC)

David Carrington-Jones

2000

“David Carrington-Jones was wrongly convicted in December 2000 of raping
twin sisters [K.J. and L.J.] based solely on the accusation of one of the
sisters. Carrington-Jones was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. After his conviction the girl [K.J.] falsely accused her brother,
step-father, fiancée, a boyfriend and even a customer at work of rape. Carrington-Jones denied raping the girls so he was denied parole in December
2005 and again in December 2006. In August 2007 he was released on
bail while his appeal based on the new evidence that his accuser had made
multiple false rape allegations was being considered. In October 2007
his conviction was quashed as ‘demonstrably unsafe’ by the Court of Appeals,
since the new evidence undermined the credibility of the accuser. Carrington-Jones was released after 6 years and 8 months of wrongful
imprisonment.” –
FJDB
(Argus)

England (Worcester CC)

Sirfraze Ahmed

Apr 2004

Sirfraze Ahmed was convicted of
robbery. Three masked men stole more than £30,000 from Neil
Bateman outside his home in Bodenham, England. Bateman had organized a
classic car show in Derbyshire that weekend. In Feb. 2006 two
brothers, Khalid and Mohammed Khan, pled guilty to the robbery. The
two denied being at the scene of the robbery, but admitted supplying items
used in the robbery. Although the brothers did not implicate Ahmed, he
was also charged in the robbery. Four of his fingerprints were found
on a black plastic bag left at the crime scene after it had been worn as a
mask by one of the robbers.

At his Oct. 2006
trial, Ahmed testified he was almost 50 miles away in Birmingham. Several witnesses corroborated Ahmed's alibi. He said he knew the Khan
brothers, and had helped Khalid fix cars at the house the brothers shared. Ahmed said that they would put plastic bags on the seat of a car to prevent
oil stains, and that is how his fingerprints could have gotten on the bag
found at the crime scene. In June 2007 the Court of Appeals
quashed his conviction on the basis there was insufficient evidence that he
was involved in the robbery. (Hereford
Times) (HT
#2) [9/08]

England (Luton CC)

Nico Bento

Dec 13, 2005 (Bedford)

Amilton Nicolas Bento (aka Nico),
a Portuguese immigrant, was convicted of the murder of his 26-year-old
Polish girlfriend, Kamila Garsztka. The alleged crime occurred in Bedford, England
in or near the River Great Ouse. A CCTV security camera caught Garsztka
walking alone on the embankment of the river toward Priory Lake which adjoined the river. Garsztka's
coat, scarf, and shoes were found by the river bank about an hour later. Bento reported Garsztka missing and pestered police to step up their search
for her and keep him informed. He told police Garsztka had left her
handbag in his apartment, which police later retrieved. Seven weeks
after she went missing, canoeists found her body floating in Priory Lake.Read More by Clicking Here

England (Teesside CC)

Richard Alan Watkins

Dec 2007

“Richard Alan Watkins was wrongly convicted on July 2, 2010, of raping a
17-year-old boy during a Christmas party in December 2007. [Watkins'
co-defendant, Kevin David Moore,] was acquitted of committing the rape,
while the jury convicted Watkins of having ‘aided and abetted’ him as part
of a ‘joint enterprise.’ [Moore's defense] was the sex was consensual and
the jury agreed. The trial judge granted Watkins bail while appealing his
conviction. In September 2010 Watkins' conviction was quashed on the basis
that the there was no ‘sensible explanation’ for how the jury could have
[convicted] him of aiding and abetting a rape that never happened. Because
he was granted bail after his conviction, Watkins didn't serve any time in
jail.” – FJDB

Wales (Cardiff CC)

Cardiff Three

Feb 14, 1988

“Yusef Abdullahi, Tony Paris, and Stephen Miller
[were dubbed by the media as] the Cardiff Three. Twenty-year-old prostitute Lynette White was murdered
on Valentine's Day in 1988 by being stabbed more than 50 times. Stephen
Miller was the boyfriend and pimp of Ms. White. Miller was coerced into
falsely confessing to the murder of Ms. White after 13 continuous hours of
being shouted at and threatened by police interrogators. His false
confession implicated his two codefendants who were likewise innocent. Once
he confessed, the police stopped investigating promising leads that may have
led to the killer. The three men were convicted in 1990 and sentenced to life
in prison. The convictions of all three codefendants were quashed by
England's Court of Appeal in 1992 and they were released after 4 years in
custody.”

“Six years after their release journalist Satish Sekar, who
had aided in the release of the men, published a book about the case – Fitted
In: The Cardiff Three and the Lynette White Inquiry. As a result of the
information in the book Ms. White's murder case was re-opened in June 1999. In 2003 DNA testing of crime scene evidence identified Jeffrey Gafoor
[as] Ms.
White's murderer. Gafoor was one of Ms. White's clients. He pled guilty to
her murder in 2003 and was sentenced to life in prison. In December 2008
three witnesses who gave false evidence at the trial of the Cardiff Three
were jailed for 18 months after pleading guilty to perjury. In March 2009
two more witnesses at the trial were charged with perjury, and 13 police
officers involved in the original investigation of the murder were charged
with perverting the course of justice for their actions that amounted to
framing the three innocent men for the crime.” –
FJDB (Innocent)

Wales (Shrewsbury CC)

Eddie Browning

June 18, 1988

Edward Owen Browning was convicted of the murder
of Marie Wilks, a 22-year-old who was seven months pregnant. Wilks'
car had broken down on the eastbound M50 carriageway near Bushley, Hereford
and Worcester. She had used an
emergency phone on the side of the road to summon help but was
abducted and stabbed shortly thereafter. The phone was left dangling
from its cord and blood was found nearby. Two days later her body was
found three miles away down an embankment on the eastbound carriageway. Her throat had been cut. She also had a broken jaw from being hit or
kicked on the left side of her head.

Browning was
identified as the perpetrator by witnesses after a composite sketch was
made. In 1994, Browning was released from jail after an appeals court
found that his conviction was unsafe. Judges ruled that the jurors
might have changed their mind if they had known of police evidence about the
murderer's car that was not disclosed at the trial.

Peter Clarke, an
off-duty West Mercia officer, was filmed four days before Browning's arrest.
He described the murderer's car as a silver-grey nonmetallic non-hatchback Renault car, with
chrome bumpers and the registration number C856 HFK. Browning's car
was a hatchback Renault, with plastic bumpers, and the registration number
C754 VAD. Police had also failed to disclose two earlier statements
from Clarke as well as one by another witness. These statements described what
the witnesses saw
on the M50. Browning was later awarded an undisclosed sum, believed to
be in excess of £600,000. (BBC)
(Timeline) [9/08]

Scotland

Oscar Slater

Dec 21, 1908 (Glasgow)

Oscar Slater was sentenced to death for
the murder of Marion Gilchrist, an 82-year-old wealthy
spinster. Gilchrist was found bludgeoned to death in her Glasgow home. Three
witnesses saw a man exit Gilchrist's home and walk quickly by them
immediately before one of them found her murdered body. The only thing
missing from Gilchrist's home was her diamond brooch.

Police soon got a
tip from a man who said Slater had tried to sell him a pawn ticket for a
diamond brooch. They also found that Slater had a checkered past. While
he had no criminal record, he used assumed names to escape from creditors. When police went to look for Slater they found that he and his mistress had
left Glasgow by train, bound for Liverpool, where on Dec. 26, the couple
sailed on the Lusitania, under an assumed name, bound for New York. Police were sure that Slater was Gilchrist's murderer because not only did
he pawn a diamond brooch, but he exhibited evidence of guilt by secretly
fleeing to the United States.Read More by Clicking Here

Scotland

Stuart Gair

Apr 11, 1989 (Glasgow)

Stuart Gair
was convicted by a majority verdict of the murder of 45-year-old Peter
Smith. Smith was the victim of a knife attack on North Court Lane in the
Glasgow city center. He later died from his injuries. During trial, a
witness, Brian Morrison, identified Gair and a co-defendant, now apparently
deceased, as the perpetrators. However, the prosecution withheld from the
defense four statements that Morrison gave which undermined his
credibility. On appeal in 2006, the senior judge said that the “statements
showed that Morrison was prepared to tell lies, to fantasise, and to change
his account when it suited him.” Morrison told the appeals court, “All
the details I gave were given to me. I saw nothing at all.” Gair's conviction
was subsequently quashed. (The
Herald)

Scotland

Asbury & McKie

Jan 8, 1997 (Kilmarnock)

David Asbury was convicted of
murdering 51-year-old Marion Ross and stealing a biscuit tin from her
containing £1800. The victim's ribs were crushed and she was stabbed
in the eye with scissors. The scissors were left embedded in her throat. There were no signs of forced entry, but police discovered that some
builders, including Asbury, had had access to her home the previous year. During a search of Asbury's apartment, Detective Shirley McKie found a
biscuit tin in his bedroom containing £1800. Asbury maintained the tin
and the money were his. However the Scottish Fingerprint Service, a
division of the Scottish Criminal Records Office (SCRO), found Ross's
fingerprint on it. Since the tin provided a possible motive of theft
for the murder, police believed the tin had belonged to the victim. At
Asbury's trial for murder, expert witnesses from the SCRO testified that a
fingerprint found on the tin was that of Ross.Read More by
Clicking Here